Classical Education and Player-Centered Coaching - Review #1

In my career I have been a Teacher and a Coach - in two instances I was both at the same time. I learned by my own experiences that a Coach is also a Teacher and that a Teacher sometimes is not a Coach. Let’s look at the differences.

It’s 4:00 on Monday and I’m leaving my sixth grade classroom in Depue, Illinois, and heading for the basketball gym at the other end of the school building. I am leaving one learning environment and going to an entire different learning environment. 

This morning every one of my 22 sixth graders studied the same list of spelling words. Today we talked about how these words were pronounced. Tomorrow we will discuss the meaning of each of these words.. Wednesday, I will have them take the trial test to get ready to take the week’s test on Friday. This afternoon we all worked in Math class learning how to divide one common fraction by another common fraction. They will take the complete math test, including fractions later this year.

They all read the same story in their readers and answered the same questions in their reading workbooks. Reading their science books about magnets was the same for everyone. 

Motivation among the different students varied from “I like this.” to “I don’t like this.” The Normal Learning Curve ranged from F- to A+, you know, kind of “Normal.” Janet was bored that the tasks were too easy - while Janice was struggling with the same material and losing the battle.

I got to the gym. All of the players were enjoying shooting baskets- warming   up. You could feel the joy, the high energy, the positive motivation of doing their tasks.  First, I sat down with my lightweight players and we talked about how last Friday’s game went for the team and for each of them. We took a look at what we would be working on for the week. Then I had them do some passing and cutting under the leadership of the co-captains while I moved over to doing similar tasks with the heavyweights. 

I went back and forth between the teams doing passing drills, switching on defense, guarding their opponents, etc. There were a lot of game-type activities. I coached the guards as if each one of them was a unique guard - I coached the forwards as if each one of them was a unique forward - I coached the centers as if each one of them was a unique center. The motivation was natural and positive at all times and every player felt that he was acknowledged - Jordan (the most talented guard) and Gordon (the least talented guard) were both deeply involved and happy.

So, what is the Major Point here?

Classical Teaching had me teaching the entire class of 22 people as if they were one person. 

Player-Centered Coaching had me coaching 30 players and treating them as 30 persons. 

We certainly don’t want to change our one-on-one experiences with our players but how do we, or perhaps, can we, teach our classroom students on that one-to-on relationship? The answer is, “Of course, we can.” If so, how so?

Let’s explore this next week.